Roger Dawson - Power Negotiating for Salespeople: Inside Secrets from a Master Negotiator

Resounding Praise for the Work of Roger Dawson:

I can't believe it! Here's a book that is packed with wisdom that will help anyone improve their life and yet it is easy and fun to read! Amazing!

Og Mandino, author of The Greatest Salesman in the World

A fast, entertaining read that should be required reading for anyone who deals with people. Highly recommended.

Ken Blanchard, coauthor of The One Minute Manager

Roger Dawson's great book will help you create and expand one of the most critical skills to life-long success.

Anthony Robbins, author of Awaken the Giant Within

I wish I knew what Roger knows about negotiating before I bought my first property.

Robert G. Allen

This edition first published in 2019 by Career Press,
an imprint of Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC
With offices at:
65 Parker Street, Suite 7
Newburyport, MA 01950
www.redwheelweiser.com
www.careerpress.com

Copyright 2001, 2019 by Roger Dawson
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and
retrieval system, without permission in writing from Red Wheel/
Weiser, LLC. Reviewers may quote brief passages. Previously published
in hardcover in 1999 by Career Press, ISBN: 978-1-56414-428-7.
Originally published as Secrets of Power Negotiating for Salespeople.

ISBN: 978-1-63265-148-8

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
available upon request.

Cover design by Kathryn Sky-Peck

Printed in Canada
MAR

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

www.redwheelweiser.com/newsletter

Dedicated to:

The salespeople of America.

The person at the drive-in window
who asks me if I want fries with that.

The waiter who suggests a better wine.

The retail clerk who cares enough to sell me up
to the top of the line.

The unknown salesperson on the last plane home
on a Friday night, knowing that he or she will be
back at the airport again on Sunday afternoon.

The Wall Street wizard who sells the bonds that
build the cities of this great country.

To every one of you.

You make this country great.

You are the finest salespeople in the world.

If you have any comments, suggestions, stories to share,
complaints to register, or questions to ask, please e-mail the author at:

A lot has changed in the world of selling since I wrote the first edition of this book in 2001.

Buyers are much better informed than they were in the old days. Back then, a salesperson could bluff a buyer by saying, If you add this to your product line you can expect to see a 20 percent increase in sales. Try that and the buyer will likely punch out a few numbers in his laptop and say, That's not what we found when we ran a test in our Omaha store. We only got a 4.2 percent increase in sales. Not enough to justify adding another SKU. We did 1 percent better in Chicago, but still not enough to pay off for us.

Retail buyers know exactly what it costs to commit an end cap on a holiday weekend. Or what a free sample clerk will add to a holiday weekend store sales.

Selling is changing in America. It's tougher out there. Competition is sharper than it has ever been. International competition is pushing us to do even better. The competitive advantage of being the first to get a product to market is shortening, from years, to months, to weeks in some industries. Buyers are better negotiators than they used to be. Buyers are better informed than they have ever been.

The buyers to whom you and your salespeople sell have enormous pressure on them to squeeze your prices down even more. Unless your salespeople know how to negotiate well, you can lose profitability, even if sales volume continues to climb. Price pressure has become so great that salespeople who sell to big box stores like Loews and Home Depot dread the line item reviews that happen as quickly as every six months or as long as three years apart. There is a lesson to be learned here that applies to all sales: although the buyer may place a greater emphasis, there are a host of other factors that may be just as important, such as advertising subsidies, guaranteed sales packaging, product labeling, and a dozen more factors.

But one thing has never and will never change: the salesperson gains valuable influence over a buyer when he or she teaches the buyer to do a better job.

Roger Dawson

La Habra Heights, California

Several years ago I recorded a tape cassette program called Secrets of Power Negotiating. To my delight and surprise, it became one of the best selling tape programs of all time. Because of that, sales managers across the country started calling me to come to their company and teach their salespeople how to use Power Sales Negotiating to raise their profit margins and close the sale even against lower-priced competition.

From the giants such as IBM, Xerox, Procter and Gamble, Merck Pharmaceuticals, Abbott Drugs, and General Foods to the smallest entrepreneurial startup companies, I've had a great time teaching, but what is more important, I've learned a great deal about salespeople, buyers, and the ongoing challenge of making the sale. In those years, salespeople have taught me volumes about the selling profession. They tell me that it's getting tougher out there. That only the best and brightest salespeople will grow and prosper in the 21st century. I think that the profession of selling is going to change a lot in the new millennium. Following are some of the challenges I see.

Every salesperson and sales manager whom I meet in my seminars tells me the same thing: Buyers are better negotiators than they were 10 or 20 years ago. That trend is going to continue.

I hate to put this bluntly, but here's what I think has happened. I think that the companies to whom you sell have figured out that the best and quickest way for them to put money on their bottom-line is to take it right off yours!

Think about it for a moment. Your customers have three ways to improve their profits:

1. The first way is to sell more. This means either going head to head with a competitor (to improve their market share by taking away some of their competitor's business), or creating new or different products and carving out a new market (something that is very risky and expensive to do).
2. The second way is for them to reduce their operating expenses. This is done by firing employees or buying expensive new equipment.
3. The third way is to do a better job negotiating with you and their other suppliers. This is far easier and it takes money right off your bottom-line and puts it directly onto theirs.

So, what's happening is that companies are upgrading the position of buyer. Whereas 10 years ago you may have been selling to a buyer who moved up through the ranks, now you're dealing with someone who may have a master's degree in business.

He or she may have just come back from a week-long negotiating course at Harvard University. These people know that doing a better job negotiating with you is a much easier way to improve their profits than increasing their market share or trying to shave more off their operating costs.